


When a Man Is Tested

by jelazakazone



Category: Privates (TV)
Genre: Blow Jobs, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Masturbation, Wall Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-28
Updated: 2013-02-28
Packaged: 2017-12-03 21:58:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/703071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jelazakazone/pseuds/jelazakazone
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>White-Bowne can’t believe he’s falling for Wratten</p>
            </blockquote>





	When a Man Is Tested

**Author's Note:**

  * For [spaceelevator](https://archiveofourown.org/users/spaceelevator/gifts).



> spaceelevator asked for this pairing and this is what came out. Thanks so much for flaying me and making it better, spaceelevator. Sorry you had to beta your own gift. Any remaining errors are mine. [Read on LJ here](http://jelazakazone.livejournal.com/709804.html). [Read on Dreamwidth here.](http://jelazakazone.dreamwidth.org/686011.html)

Private White-Bowne stands in front of the window, gnawing on the remains of his shredded cuticles. His anxiety is coming out in odd manners, but the rest of the lads won’t know that. They don’t know he isn’t usually the nervous sort, who jiggles a knee, or laughs at strange moments, or chews on his nails.  
  
He’d huffed into his hands in the truck on the way to the base and even accepted a cigarette, stowing it in a pocket upon arrival, thankful for the distraction that meant he didn’t actually have to touch the damned thing to his mouth without a holder to separate the filthy end from his lips.  
  
He knows he stands out for a number of reasons: class, education, clothing, manner of speaking, his father’s connections. Hell, Lomax, who appears to be crazier than a bat out of hell, fits in better with this disjointed lot of boys than he does.  
  
Every day since he’d turned eighteen, White-Bowne had dreaded the card that failed to come, and failed to come, and failed to come, until the day it did.  
  
“Don’t worry, son,” his father had said. “You’ll go in, serve three weeks, and then get exemption to serve as the Tory candidate. You just have to survive three weeks. It will be just like boarding school.”  
  
White-Bowne had nodded stiffly in agreement with his father, wondering if he actually could survive three weeks in army barracks with seven other recruits who came from God only knew where. It wasn’t going to be like boarding school at all.  
  
White-Bowne turns as a slammed door brings him back to the present. Lips pressed tightly together, he nods to himself, mutters under his breath.  
  
Wratten comes in, swaggering towards him.  
  
“Well, you sure are a queer one,” he says with an extra emphasis on “queer.”  
  
“I am sure I don’t know what you mean,” W-B retorts, drawing himself up to his full height.  
  
“Fancy boy,” Wratten sneers, as Hoy and a few others start drifting in.  
  
“Look, Wratten, just because I enjoy certain privileges that you will probably never know--” He stops short as Wratten interrupts him.  
  
“I could care less about your _privileges, Daddy’s boy_.”  
  
Wratten steps into White-Bowne’s personal space, pressing him up against the wall with the force of his presence. He reaches up and starts neatening White-Bowne's collar, smoothing the rough brown shirt across his shoulder. White-Bowne represses an incipient shiver. He refuses to think about the pleasure of those hands on his bare flesh, except now it's too late and that’s exactly what he's thinking about. He closes his eyes in a vain attempt to compose himself.  
  
In the background, he can hear the lads parroting some of Wratten’s words: “fancy boy” and “Daddy’s boy,” and possibly even “Pansy.”  
  
“Wratten, step away,” he hears Keenan say. “Don’t you have some cleaning to do?” Damn the man. He can take care of this himself, really.  
  
Wratten’s hands glide down his arms as he steps back, leaving him cooler than he had been before the man had stepped up to him. He gives White-Bowne a knowing look before turning away.  
  
White-Bowne flushes, indignant; then he slumps back against the wall. How is Keenan the one with all the power here? How has he got all the men working like Snow White’s dwarves, cleaning up their kits? He gives himself an internal shake, then looks at Keenan.  
  
Keenan cocks an eyebrow and nods once before turning to his own kit.  
  
***  
  
White-Bowne tries to keep his distance from Wratten, but the man is like a piece of lint he can’t pick off. He sits next to White-Bowne when Davies sings for them after Keenan orchestrates the men to prove that Davies is not a coward.  
  
“When a man is tested, he finds his strength.”  
  
White-Bowne is both disgusted and amazed with Keenan who seems to be oblivious to his leadership qualities. As the heat from Wratten’s thigh soaks into his own, White-Bowne can’t quite admit to himself that he’s being tested and is petrified that he doesn’t have the strength.  
  
***  
  
Last one to run the course, Wratten struggles. White-Bowne is cheering alongside the rest of the lads while Barrowman, the fucker, is clearly trying to unnerve the lad. Again. But Wratten is managing, just barely, until the final obstacle, when he falls and writhes on the ground in agony. Barrowman comes over and gives Wratten a look of disgust, but Wratten looks to White-Bowne in his haze of pain and confusion. Stunned, White-Bowne misses the opportunity to accompany him to the infirmary before Keenan enthusiastically pipes up, “I’ll take him, Corporal.”  
  
****  
  
The loo. The fucking loo. How degrading, it’s come to this. There is no place for privacy. If one wants a proper wank, it’s got to be the loo, the only piece of real estate where a _private_ \-- and there’s irony in _that_ title if he's ever heard it -- can lock the door and find a moment alone.  
  
He leans back, the toilet tank pressing into his back uncomfortably, but the need is too great. Between Wratten’s tender advances -- adjusting his collar, sitting beside him thigh to thigh, the heated glances -- and then watching Keenan lick his lips constantly, White-Bowne’s cock is hard all the time.  
  
He hears the men getting ready for bed, rustling around in the barracks. Someone else is brushing their teeth in the bathroom, he thinks. A tap on the counter confirms his suspicions. He tries to lean back and relax, but the damned tank bites into his back again. He stretches out his long legs, beyond caring if they stick out from under the stall door. He has business to attend to.  
  
Pushing aside any lingering ambivalence, he unzips his trousers and tugs his underpants aside, freeing his dick. Ah, the sweet relief, of having his hard length in his hand, skin on skin. He hasn’t been this horny since he was a pimply teen, fantasizing about some boy whose name he can’t even remember. Today, though, he’s got a name to go with the face in his mind. Keenan.  
  
Lips. Tongue. Teeth. White-Bowne focuses on those images, of Keenan parting his lips. He knows Keenan’s not _actually_ parting his lips for him, but oh, if he were, God — to have his cock in Keenan’s mouth, Keenan's lips stretched around him, sucking him, to thrust into that wet heat.  
  
He knows he can’t linger; there isn't time. With a muffled grunt, he spills into his hand. His ears ring for a moment. In his mind he knows he should be hurrying, to get “the crack of his backside” cleaned up and himself in bed before lights out, but post-orgasmic bliss has him completely indifferent to the directives. He sags a bit, wondering how he will ever survive years in the service, let alone weeks.  
  
***  
  
There is never a break in boot camp. One day they are running the course and then stuck with KP duty, the next Barrowman has them kitted up in full gear, gas masks and everything. White-Bowne thinks he should be used to this, to pretending to be soldiers with the lads, but he isn’t. He’s still a sore thumb on an elegant hand, sticking out painfully.  
  
The boys all look at each other, wondering if they are really going to be doing this, breathing in poison gas, but the look on Barrowman’s face let’s them know it’s real.  
  
Taking a deep breath and squaring his shoulders, White-Bowne pulls the mask over his face, gritting his teeth at the sharp edges that dig into his flesh. The smell of dirty rubber almost makes him gag, but he swallows his gorge, focused on getting through this trial.  
  
“Two Section,” Barrowman cries, “Two Section, in a gas attack, if you don't get your mask on in seconds, you'll be dead. We're going to find out how you react in those seconds.  
Everybody inside! Come on, move! Come on! Hurry up.”  
  
White-Bowne is focused on not losing his shit as they hustle into the cramped shack with gas billowing inside. He _will_ handle this drill. They crowd inside and Barrowman yells, “When I call you, step up and take off the mask. Give your name, rank and number. Do you understand?"  
  
The men all stand at attention as Hoy, Keenan, and Davies pull up their masks and spit out their name, rank, and number. White-Bowne cannot tell if it’s his anxiety or the gas mask not working properly that’s making him a little dizzy, but then it's Wratten's turn. Now he knows his heart is racing because Barrowman always gives Wratten a hard time.  
  
White-Bowne can almost feel Wratten’s agony as he nervously spits out his information, but the corporal isn’t letting him out. He’s still nattering on at Wratten who collapses, twisting White-Bowne’s heart. Fuck this shit. He’s taking the man out.  
  
He grabs Wratten and drags him out of the shack, the two of them falling in a heap on the grass. White-Bowne doesn’t even care. He’s cradling Wratten’s head in his hands. Wratten’s face is so little in his big hands and he’s yelling, “Eddie, Eddie, Eddie,” urging him to come around, heart pounding that Barrowman really has gone too far this time. Or maybe he’s the one who’s gone too far, called Barrowman “Eddie,” in front of everyone like that.  
  
Wratten coughs and White-Bowne starts breathing again. “Easy, easy,” he comforts, patting him on the back. He helps Wratten to his feet, supporting him on the walk back to the barracks. White-Bowne sits on Wratten’s cot. He can’t keep his hands off him, so he settles for rubbing Wratten’s leg and tries to look natural, not overly familiar.  
  
Attempting to be sympathetic, he says, “You remind me of Judy in her last days. My labrador!” When this doesn’t quite get the response he was hoping for, he adds, “She died of distemper.”  
  
Clutching a bucket and looking about as pathetic as a man can, Wratten says miserably, “I'm gonna be under Barrowman's thumb until I get out of this place.”  
  
 _A-ha_ , White-Bowne thinks, grabbing at the opportunity. “Unless you do something about it.”  
  
“What am I supposed to do? He's paid to make our lives hell.”  
  
“But not to almost kill you.”  
  
White-Bowne’s heart leaps when he sees the look on Wratten’s face. The man is hooked.  
  
****  
  
Hornier than he’s been in a long time, White-Bowne finds himself in the bathroom, again. This time though, he’s got Wratten by the throat, pinned against the wall, and they're alone.  
  
“Eddie,” White-Bowne rasps, “are you fucking with me?”  
  
Wratten splutters, gags, shakes his head vigorously. White-Bowne realizes the man is trying to suck in air and he lets up, a little. Then he lets go. Fuck, what was he even thinking? He slumps, sure he’s got it completely wrong, whatever “it” is anymore. He’s so horny and sick of hiding his attraction — it makes his head spin, like there’s a typhoon in there.  
  
White-Bowne is stepping away when he feels Wratten’s finger lightly touching his wrist. The contact on his bare skin makes him shiver. He can’t repress it. He stills, cringing at what he expects to hear.  
  
“You may be an arrogant, entitled, self-absorbed, asshole, White-Bowne, but no one has ever looked at me the way you do,” Wratten murmurs.  
  
White-Bowne feels his jaw drop. His mouth is just hanging there, open, for what feels like an eternity.  
  
“What?”  
  
Wratten nods, looking a little smug.  
  
“What are you saying, Wratten?”  
  
White-Bowne is right back in Wratten’s personal space, hands on the wall, arms caging Wratten in. He leans in, his face a hair's breadth away from Wratten’s. Wratten tries to look away, but there’s no room to turn his head. White-Bowne strokes his smooth cheek, hardly believing that he can do this here, in this place. He knows that Wratten is street-wise, but the man also has a kid. His heart wrestles with his mind; does Wratten have room in his heart for a man like him? He would be risking so much, to get involved.  
  
Sexual tension makes him bold. He leans in for a kiss. Wratten responds, lips moving softly against his. Emboldened, White-Bowne slips his tongue inside, eager for deeper contact, enjoying the rasp of tongue on lips and lips on lips and tongue on tongue. He moans and breaks away.  
  
“Prove it,” he demands. “Prove that you aren’t just trying to street-wise your way through this.”  
  
Jesus fucking Christ, the man is quick with a zipper. White-Bowne's cock is free in moments, curled in a cool, calloused hand. White-Bowne pushes into it, not thinking, just reacting. It feels so good, to be pushing against someone else’s hand for a change, and he’s so aroused. He’s been aroused for days.  
  
He doesn’t notice that Wratten has dropped to his knees until he feels a wet mouth working the tip of his cock. White-Bowne braces himself, palms of his hands against the slick cold tile. He cannot help but thrust into Wratten’s warm, wet mouth.  
  
“Oh, so good,” he grunts, thrusting again and again, Wratten sucking and licking, coaxing him closer, and then he is no longer in control, spurting into Wratten’s mouth. Wratten looks thoroughly debauched when White-Bowne pulls out, his mouth red and bruised. He is a perfect picture of temptation and sin. It's all White-Bowne can do to groan and rest his head on the arms he has braced against the wall as he tries to regain some sense of balance."  
  
“Eddie,” he whispers, “What the hell was that?”  
  
Wratten looks up at him, a mischievous glint in his eyes.  
  
“Proof.”  
  
For the moment, all shame, all self-loathing is wiped away. White-Bowne pulls him up by his collar, seized with a desire to devour Wratten, starting with his mouth. He slips his tongue between Wratten’s lips, kissing him thoroughly, unable to show his appreciation any other way.  
  



End file.
